So contends a new literature survey from the social-conservative Institute on Marriage and Public Policy (Douglas W. Allen and Maggie Gallagher, “Does Divorce Law Affect the Divorce Rate? A Review of Empirical Research, 1995-2006“, PDF, requires registration; “Split Decisions” (interview with Maggie Gallagher), Newsweek, May 23). New York, among the few states to have retained fault-based divorce laws, is considering a move to no-fault.
No-fault laws boost divorce rate by 10 percent?
So contends a new literature survey from the social-conservative Institute on Marriage and Public Policy (Douglas W. Allen and Maggie Gallagher, “Does Divorce Law Affect the Divorce Rate? A Review of Empirical Research, 1995-2006“, PDF, requires registration; “Split Decisions” (interview with Maggie Gallagher), Newsweek, May 23). New York, among the few states to have retained […]
5 Comments
Given what we know of economics and human behavior, you’d think there would be some marginal effect from no-fault laws.
I’m actually kind of surprised it’s only 10%.
I’m not sure the study is all that meaningful in the end. Making it more difficult to divorce may reduce the divorce rate, but from my personal observations I doubt it actually keeps couples together.
I’ve encountered many married people “living in sin” with new partners who haven’t bothered to get divorced, or who tried to divorce but had the spouse they’d left refuse to sign the papers.
IMHO most of that 10% difference represents the illusion of families staying together when the reality is that they’re not.
Come to think of it, that might be a good thing as it keeps at least some people out of the family courts.
I’m also surprised it’s so low.
Considering just the pressure to be “first to file” (and thus get a divorce when otherwise neither might have done so), I would have expected higher, not to mention the additional burden and airing of laundry that is lifted with the switch-over.
One thing fault divorce certainly does is increase fees for divorce lawyers, who develop fault-based pleadings — notwithstanding that family law judges will do everything in their power to avoid a trial on fault (at least in New York). They also can affect negotiating postures — the party moving out can’t file for “actual abandonment” and, absent adultery, must develop a case of “cruel and inhuman treatment” to get divorce proceedings initiated.
Needless to say, a major impact of fault laws is to increase the marginal cost of divorce. So it’s not surprising that they’d lower divorce on the margin. The question is whether that’s a good thing…
Fault divorce also was great for private investigators, who were retained to prove the other spouse’s adultery. I’d be curious as to whether there are fewer battles over custody, alimony, etc. with no-fault than with fault divorce. The need to put someone at fault creates an inherent antagonism that may be reflected in more fighting over issues related to the divorce.